Sydney
Climate change emerged Friday as the make-or-break issue at a
meeting in Sydney of 21 Asia-Pacific leaders with rich and poor
countries dividing on traditional lines.
Developing country members led by China were resisting a bid by host
Australia to lock them into setting goals for reducing the emissions
that cause global warming.
Prime Minister John Howard had hoped to close the Asia-Pacific
Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit Sunday with a declaration that
set out "an agreed aspirational goal" for cutting emissions.
US President George W. Bush lined up behind Howard, saying, "In
order for there to be an effective climate change policy, China
needs to be at the table."
But Chinese President Hu Jintao refused to take the seat offered
him, insisting that climate change agreements were best addressed
through UN initiatives like the 1997 Kyoto Protocol.
Kyoto gives 35 developed countries legally binding reduction targets
but developing countries only were required to pledge compliance at
some later date.
Hu said the APEC declaration needed to give "full expression" to the
primacy of the UN's role and acknowledge "differentiated
responsibilities" between rich and poor nations.
Hu's formulation emboldened Malaysia and other developing countries
to demand a revision of a draft that Howard said he hoped to
proclaim as the Sydney Declaration.
Howard is still pushing for the adoption of a "new flexible
framework that includes a long-term global goal and encourages a
wide range of natural actions by all with ongoing review processes."
This year's APEC host might yet be successful because the draft
doesn't mirror Kyoto and fix actual targets - or prescribe any
punishment for those who fail to reach their target.
In the view of developing countries, Australia lacks moral authority
in asking them to play their part in a multilateral initiative to
address climate change.
Along with the US, Australia refused to accept a reductions target
in the Kyoto process - insisting that the pact was faulty because
developing countries weren't obliged to bear any of the burden.
Some analysts said Howard had overreached himself in shooting for a
strong statement on climate change. Others accused him of lacking
seriousness in dealing with the issue.
Richard Woolcott, a former ambassador to Indonesia and head of the
Foreign Affairs Department, said: "Howard talks of aspirational
goals, probably because he knows no targets will be set."
If agreement on the draft can't be thrashed out at a ministerial
level, the task of settling on an acceptable form of words would
pass to the leaders themselves when they meet Saturday and Sunday in
a private retreat.
The pressure is on for a settlement by Saturday - before Bush's
evening flight aboard Air Force One back to Washington.
Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia,
Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea,
Peru, Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, the US and
Vietnam comprise APEC, which represents half the world's trade, a
third of its population and 60 percent of the output of its goods
and services.
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